Real Duppies Stories: Stranger duppy gets a beating

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She was born with a piece of fat over her face, thus the reason she said she had seen so many duppies. She is a firm believer in their existence, and said only God can tell her otherwise.

One 'brown-dusk' evening, she and her father, with whom she and a sister were living, fell out. She decided to leave for her mother's house, so she collected her pieces of clothes, folded them, and put them under her arm. She was not going to put up with her father shouting at her.

Minutes before, McKenzie had seen a woman walking by her yard. The woman wore a pink dress with a white apron, and carried a round basket on her head. Yet, the woman had no face.

She wondered where the woman was coming from that time of evening because it was not a market day.

McKenzie dashed out of the yard, hoping to catch up with the woman because night was fast approaching.

She ran until she saw the woman around a bend, but as hard as she tried, she could not catch up with the woman, who disappeared just like that.

She was to have many more sightings of 'spirits' that just vanished in thin air, like the man she sawsitting under a mango tree, rolling tobacco on his leg, one very hot day.

Her cousin Ashley was right beside her, but could not see what she was showing him as hard as he tried. She had never seen him in her district, so she pointed at the man.

"See him deh, see him deh," she whispered to Ashley.

Then the man looked away from the tobacco, straight at McKenzie. She could see the white of his eyes before he too vanished.

She believes that the eye contact she had made with that duppy 'blinded' her, as he was the last duppy she saw.

"And from deh soh, mi no see no more so plain," she recalled. Yet, she still feels their presence.

However, McKenzie' most fascinating duppy story is that of Miss Haye's duppy who followed her cousin Busha home one night.

Busha was coming from a dance only to see Miss Haye coming down a hill. He quickened his pace because he knew that woman was long dead.

Busha walked fast, trying to outpace Miss Haye, but she was tagging right along. To get to his house he turned into a lane, and when he looked back, there was Miss Haye in hot pursuit.

He walked through Miss Eny's yard to reach his house.

There, he frantically called his father while knocking on the door. His father let him in, slammed the door, and locked it.

But, he was terrified when he saw one of Miss Haye's fingers coming through a crack in the door.

Unsuccessful in opening the door, Miss Haye turned back, but she was in for a most unpleasant encounter herself.

To get back from whence she had come, she walked through Miss Eny's yard in which there were many duppies who were not familiar with her.

They grabbed Miss Haye, and gave her a piece of beating. As the blows stung her she screamed, "Waai! Waai! Waai!"

And that was the last time, perhaps, that Miss Haye's duppy went where it did not belong.